<p>pittsmom–Thanks for the suggestion about asking for reconsideration. We have thought about contacting Pitt, and son is waiting to hear about full scholarship application at another school. We wondered if choice of major (son is biology) affected scholarship offer. Perhaps Pitt has enough biology majors but not enough physics, etc.?</p>
<p>Yes, I agree to ask for reconsideration. Just a week or two ago a student with decent stats was denied from main Pitt campus and sent to one of the satellites. I encouraged him to contact Pitt on the assumption a mistake had been made. Turned out that’s what happened. It can’t hurt to ask. Your son’s choice of major is not a factor, in my opinion, because so many kids change their major anyway.</p>
<p>Do you think asking for reconsideration will possibly help with a OOS student as well? Her SAT is above 1450 so it seemed like she was at least in contention for a full tuition scholarship but she only got 12k/yr. She received almost 20k/yr to UMinn-TC which is a similarly ranked school. So, looking at just tuition & R&B, COA is about 20k/yr for Pitt vs. about 5k/yr for UMinn. She hasn’t visited either, but really likes Pitt from what she’s read about it. I guess it wouldn’t hurt to try??</p>
<p>Yes, you should ask for reconsideration, definitely!</p>
<p>Thanks, will do!</p>
<p>^entomom</p>
<p>did your daughter apply later… like in december rather than sept, oct, or nov? </p>
<p>i ask because i applied in december as an OOS student and also received the $12k. i have a 1500 SAT, 35 ACT and a 3.92 UW/4.45W. i too received numerous other awards but i applied to those schools earlier. i know many kids with lower stats than me were awarded full tuition early on, and i had the feeling perhaps it was related to timing.</p>
<p>it is a little disheartening because the money does matter to me, and if i had received the full tuition i would most likely choose to attend pitt.</p>
<p>It’s really hard to say what the guidelines for the scholarships are, because Pitt has never disclosed more than generalities. It may matter which high school you’re from, it may matter if you’re from a state that’s underrepresented in the Pitt student body. And yes, it may matter how early you’ve applied. But for as long as I’ve been observing this process, which is five years now, seemingly worthy students get passed over. I would recommend to everyone in this position to contact the school and ask for a reevaluation.</p>
<p>ciao,
She submitted in early Nov and was accepted shortly after.</p>
<p>Agree w/LNM that’s it’s just about impossible to determine the exact reasons they base scholarship decisions on, and likely the reasons change from one applicant to the next. At any rate, D2 will give it one last ‘Hail Mary’ and try to plead her case.</p>
<p>The scholarship parameters are impossible to figure out AND it seems as though they change each year–and even during the year.</p>
<p>Follow-up to request for a reevaluation of Pitts scholarship offer: D2 sent an email last night and today received a reply:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Very interesting. I guess I’m surprised that this person gives such exact stats to qualify for consideration for full tuition, the person I talked to on the phone a couple of months ago stressed that although numbers important, they are not the only factors considered. And from my recollection of the posts here, not everyone receiving full tuition met all of these stats. Unfortunately CCs Search function is not working right now, so I can’t review the stats people have posted.</p>
<p>The other interesting part is that while gpa and class rank are thresholds of 4.0 and 2%, respectively, SAT/ACT is an AVERAGE of 1560/35. That’s pretty high and more importantly, by definition, some scores will be above and some below 1560/35.</p>
<p>My d would be one of those to whom you refer–she had the grades, rank but a 31 ACT, didn’t take the SAT. Got full tuition. I should add that she had 34-35 on everything except science reasoning, which brought down the composite. Feeling pretty lucky here.</p>
<p>this is what brings me back to my statement about timing… there were many full tuition awards given early on to applicants whose stats definitely do not meet that criteria. it’s fine. i did meet the criteria but i guess pitt didn’t really want me there. thankfully other schools do.</p>
<p>quilll, since they only look at M + CR for the SAT, they probably do likewise for the ACT and didn’t count her science subscore. Congrats to her!</p>
<p>Also, I want to correct my earlier statement about what factors are considered for the full/partial tuition scholarships. I just went back and looked at my posting history and see that the person I talked to on the phone actually said that these scholarships are MOSTLY numbers based but that the Chancellor’s looks at a broader range of factors.</p>
<p>x-posted w/ciao. I’m not discounting timing (it is a rolling school after all), but given the verbiage in the email, if they’re counting UW gpa, that could have knocked you out of the running.</p>
<p>Wow, 1560! That is a crazy high number!</p>
<p>My daughter loved PITT and applied for last year in August w/33 ACT, #1/350, 4.6 GPA OS, lots of EC, was offered $12,000 and when I asked them to reconsider they wouldn’t budge. She got into the pharmacy program, and last year reading the posts I noticed that the engineering majors were getting bigger scholarships with lower stats, so maybe the major does matter. She’s at Ohio State and loves it there.</p>
<p>NEohio–The engineering students have an additional scholarship available. My D is not in engineering, so I do not know the details.</p>
<p>those are different requirements than my admissions counselor emailed to me on january 6th… she didn’t say anything about an average, simply that they look for:</p>
<p>–SAT CR+M of 1490 (better chance if over 1500) or minimum 33 (prefer 34 or higher) on both the English & Math sections of ACT
–top 5% rank in class
–GPA in line with rank</p>
<p>it definitely seems like the criteria tightens as the application time frame progresses. i’m really not trying to argue, i recall that several of the earliest offers of full tuition had even lower stats than those she stated to me in early january. i just wish i’d applied earlier, but pitt didn’t really cross my radar until december.</p>
<p>Ds submitted app 10/18, was accepted mid-Nov, didn’t get honors college so he asked to be reevaluated for UHC (making sure they used Oct SAT scores), got in but no scholarships mentioned…until today got letter with 10K/yr scholarship. So for everyone thinking scholarships came at same time as admission letter or shortly after, that may have been true for Aug-Sept submitted apps but the Oct.-Nov. ones might come out much later as in our case. Or maybe it has something to do with engineering? In any case, puts Pitt back into the running!</p>
<p>Applied and accepted early November… OOS… Honors college and grad school guarantee. Just received scholarship letter with 10K/year</p>
<p>Today also got $10K/year. Applied in early December, honors just before Xmas. OOS, GPA 3.6 UW/4.0 W, 2190 SAT, 7 APs. Cool.</p>